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Introduction to the listing

“A child who has never seen a pantomime,” wrote George Bernard Shaw in 1905, “is a public danger.”

Christmas panto time is the busiest time of year for most theatres, and indeed many make enough from their panto ticket sales to support them for the rest of the year.

And of course Christmas is very definitely a time for family visits to the theatre and most of those theatres which don’t have a panto do present shows for children and families. Some have both, with the shows for younger audiences usually aimed at under-7s.

The North East is no exception, hence this is listing of all the pantomimes and family / children’s Christmas shows in the region, from Northumberland to the north of North Yorkshire, which we hope will help guide you in your choice of family Christmas theatre.

Only shows for children and families are included.

A * denotes a non-panto show.

Times are not given because many shows vary performance times considerably throughout the run.

The ticket prices given are the cheapest and the most expensive. Prices often vary according to performance dates with the cheapest being early in the run and the most expensive at the most popular times, such as Christmas Eve.

Many venues offer a Family Ticket which can give considerable savings.

Where possible we have given a link to a web site on which full details of dates, times and prices are available.

Please note: these are all (to the best of our knowledge) professional shows. If we have missed any, we do apologise and, if we’re informed about it, we’ll correct the omission.

There are, of course, many amateur pantos—probably more than the professional productions—but they fall outside of the BTG’s normal coverage.﻿